News Feature

‘I put my hand up straight away’: The SA nurses deployed to Victoria to help fight COVID-19

By Robert Fedele

Victoria was in the grip of escalating COVID-19 outbreaks and needed help from interstate volunteers to boost its health workforce.

South Australian registered nurse Kathie Spalding, who earlier this year stepped up to the role of Nursing Unit Manager at Lyell McEwin Hospital’s COVID-19 testing clinic as the state tackled its own challenges, answered the call. “I put my hand up straight away and rustled up a bit of interest from my clinic staff. Of the 16 nurses that came over [to Victoria] from South Australia, nine were from our clinic,” she says. “My family was the first consideration and once I got the green light, it was an easy decision to make to go over.” An Emergency Department nurse, Kathie shifted into a leadership role at Lyell McEwin’s COVID-19 clinic in March. The opportunity to join Victoria’s COVID-19 frontline as part of a volunteer team of 29 nurses and paramedics, dubbed Team Alpha, added another dimension. After confirming their interest, nurses and paramedics were informed they would be spending the next two weeks working in the community across Melbourne’s COVID-19 hotspots, including Craigieburn and Fawkner, and be based at the Alfred Hospital. “We had to make sure we were fitted to an N95 mask, that we had no health risks and that we were able to fulfil the responsibilities attached to the role,” Kathie says. In Victoria, SA nurses door knocked homes and tested consenting community members for COVID-19. They also helped collect kits and supported community members to carry out their own self-swabs. Kathie says she was never afraid of contracting COVID-19 as nurses were armed with appropriate Personal Protective Equipment (PPE). Days into the deployment, thousands of residents of Flemington’s public housing towers were forced into “hard lockdown” to contain the spread of the virus, and resources, including Team Alpha, were diverted to the sites to conduct testing. “Being so far out of our control, it was a little confronting. You were a little bit concerned about the rate [of cases] and I guess for us it was about the fact that it’s so densely populated there comparatively so we just tried to support as much as we could.” The team returned to the community for a few days, moved on to support the Alfred’s COVID-19 clinic, then flew home. “Seeing the pressure everyone was under and seeing them all come together and help each other and uplift each other was just amazing,” Kathie reflects. “It helped me build up the confidence to step outside my normal day-to-day and it’s given me more of an established empathy for what other healthcare networks are going through [during the pandemic].” Back leading Lyell McEwin’s COVID-19 testing clinic, Kathie says preparing for what lies ahead remains the focus. “Our numbers have seesawed and I think we have been very fortunate. It certainly hasn’t affected us like it has some of the other states. We’re grateful for that and our hearts are going out to everyone else at the moment.”

Go to ANMJ.org.au – INTERVIEWS to read the full story

Nurse Kathie Spalding, far right, with the team at Lyell McEwin’s COVID-19 testing clinic

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